Source: RadianceTx

RadianceTx announced a $1 million first tranche closing of a targeted $7 million round of financing. The investment will be used to fund development of the company’s Beta Ophthalmic System for delivery of beta irradiation therapy to improve glaucoma surgery outcomes.

Validated in three clinical studies conducted by preeminent ophthalmic research teams, beta therapy has been shown to improve glaucoma surgery outcomes. A recent study reported odds ratios that beta irradiation therapy patients were five and a half times more likely to experience lower IOP at the end of 1 year than patients treated with the current standard of care.

Glaucoma is the leading cause of irreversible blindness. The most successful way to prevent vision loss from glaucoma is to lower intraocular pressure with drainage surgery. This surgery shunts fluid out of the eye through a channel created during a trabeculectomy procedure or by a flow-controlled drainage device placed during minimally invasive glaucoma surgery (MIGS). Despite compelling therapeutic advantages over nonsurgical treatments, drainage surgery and devices are clinically limited by postoperative scarring. RadianceTx’s Beta Ophthalmic System is designed to apply beta therapy to the surgical site to down-regulate fibroblasts that cause scar tissue, keeping the channel open and maintaining reduced intraocular pressure, according to RadianceTx.

“For glaucoma surgery to be maximally successful, anti-scarring therapies must be effective, consistent in dosage as well as fast and very easy to administer,” Sir Peng Khaw, Consultant Ophthalmic Surgeon and Professor of Glaucoma Studies and Wound Healing, and member of the Board of Directors at RadianceTx, said in a company news release. “In combination with new glaucoma drainage devices, RadianceTx Beta Ophthalmic System could revolutionize the treatment of glaucoma.”

A device solution, RadianceTx Beta Ophthalmic System is designed to topically apply beta therapy to trabeculectomy or MIGS drainage device implantation sites. Currently, scarring prevention involves the complex and time-consuming intraoperative application of antimetabolites (chemotherapy drugs) yet still results in a failure rate approaching 50 percent at three years. Ian Murdoch and colleagues have carried out three randomized controlled trials involving 728 patients which have demonstrated beta therapy’s clinical effectiveness in drainage surgery. The new RadianceTx Beta Ophthalmic System is designed to optimize surgical workflow efficiency by requiring only 25 seconds for beta therapy application, minimizing stray dosing to non-target tissues, and eliminating medical staff exposure to hazardous chemotherapy drugs.

“I am pleased to announce this initial funding for RadianceTx, which allows us to begin commercial development,” said Harry George, President and Chief Financial Officer of RadianceTx. “The RadianceTx team possesses a track record of achieving regulatory market clearances for other medical and ophthalmic devices and is poised to advance the standard of care for glaucoma surgery with the RadianceTx Beta Ophthalmic System.”